


The Only Easy Day Was Yesterday

by omelet



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Military, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-12
Updated: 2017-03-12
Packaged: 2018-10-03 00:34:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10231535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/omelet/pseuds/omelet
Summary: It’s Conor Sheary’s first mission with the squad and he’s terrified.“Relax, Shearsy,” Beau says across from him on the plane. “Same shit, different day.”Conor stares up at him. “We’re getting HALO dropped into a country with a no-fly zone. With Sidney Crosby.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is, essentially, a not very serious Call of Duty AU, based very (I mean VERY) loosely on the plot of Modern Warfare 2. It's also an Old ficlet; originally, Sheary was Sprong and I suppose that means I should replace Beau too but I will not. You cannot make me.
> 
> Title taken from a mission in MW2 lmao
> 
> Unbeta'd.

It’s Conor Sheary’s first mission with the squad and he’s terrified.

“Relax, Shearsy,” Beau says across from him on the plane. “Same shit, different day.”

Conor stares up at him. “We’re getting HALO dropped into a country with a no-fly zone. With Sidney Crosby.”

Captain Sidney Crosby - “You can just call me Sidney,” he had said sheepishly -, the youngest person to reach the rank of Captain at the age of 19 in the history of CSOR, sits on the far end of the plane, his eyes fixed on the opposing wall. He’s a legend in intelligence circles, not exactly a good thing to be in their line of work, but it doesn’t impede his mission success rates. There’s always chatter about trying to get him into black ops, trying to recruit him onto high profile wetwork squads, but the story goes that he always refuses, citing his infamy with a little knowing grin. For the most part, he leads recon and intelligence-gathering teams like this instead.

Beau grins. They’re both on loan from the Army Rangers, though Beau has gone on a few missions with these guys before. “Yeah well, it’s hard to have one guy infiltrate a highly-guarded facility. Even with the help that’s gonna meet us.”

Before Conor can ask, the pilot announces that they’re approaching the drop zone. Sidney stands by the doors, giving every guy a nod and a tap on the shoulder before they jump. Conor is the last to jump, a bundle of nerves, and Sidney pats him on the back, an apologetic smile on his face. Conor looks back, perplexed.

“Welcome to the team,” Sidney shouts over the roaring wind before he grabs him and shoves him out of the plane.

 

-

 

“Flower pushed Sidney out on his first HALO jump. Made it a tradition,” Beau says after everyone gets their feet on solid ground (It takes a while. Flower ended up getting stuck in a tree.). “At least Sidney makes sure you right yourself during the fall before he goes.”

Conor supposes he should be thankful, but he’s still trying to figure out if he pissed himself.

A little ways enroute to the facility, they come across a small cleaning and Sidney holds up a closed fist, dropping to his knee. “Justice,” he calls out.

“What a callsign,” Tanger mutters under his breath and Sidney casts him a sideways glance.

“Washington,” a voice answers. A man emerges from the brush, flanked by a few others. Sidney signals the rest of the them to stand, walking over to the man.

“Ovechkin,” Sidney greets with an odd tone, almost like relief.

“Crosby,” the man - Ovechkin - returns amiably. He grins. He’s missing a tooth. “Hoping I was someone else?”

“No, you’re just the man I wanted to see,” Sidney says evenly. Conor feels like there’s something left unsaid, judging by the knowing look Ovechkin gives him, but then it’s down to business and he shoves it to the back of his mind.

 

-

 

“You hear from Zhenya, lately?” Ovechkin asks conversationally when they’ve made it into the facility, waiting for one of his men to finish hacking into the database. Sidney hums noncommittally, squinting at the Russian words on the screen. “He’s in Azerbaijan, last time I talked to him.”

For the first time since meeting him, Conor sees Sidney’s brow furrow.

“The leadership is still testing him,” Ovechkin continues with a sigh. “When you’ve been with the motherland for that long, it takes a while for them to trust -” Suddenly, Ovechkin stops, as do the rest of the Russians, alert. “Picking up comms, got trouble coming. Sending reinforcements.”

Sidney swears sharply, cocking his rifle. “I thought you said we’d have more time.”

“Look, it’s been a while since I’ve had access to their systems,” Ovechkin quips defensively, pointing his men to the doors. “Maybe they had update.”

“How many?”

It takes a while for Ovechkin to answer as he listens to his comms. “A lot,” is the answer he finally settles with. “Luckily, we’re off the grid so if we take this team out, we’ll have time to get out of here.”

Flower is already setting down claymores and traps in the halls leading into the room while the rest of them move furniture around to set-up choke points, taking up positions behind cover.

“Still glad it’s me?” Ovechkin asks Sidney again when they get into cover, just as footsteps and shouts start echoing in the hall. Sidney huffs a laugh.

“Yeah,” he replies, looking down the sights of his rifle. “I won’t feel too bad if you die.”

 

-

 

They make it out, barely, but they miss their evac.

“We’re a rebel group,” Ovechkin says when Sidney asks if he can get them out. “We’ve got one good Pave Low. You’re more than welcome to try to hitch a ride.”

“Where?”

Ovechkin grins. “Azerbaijan.”

 

-

 

Sidney is in a mood. For some reason, Conor feels like it’s not about the three days of trekking it took to cross the border to Azerbaijan.

“It’s Geno,” Flower explains to him one night when they’re camping out. Conor has no idea who that is, but he does know that Sidney has been looking at his watch almost obsessively for the past few days. “It’s complicated. But you’ll see soon enough.”

“He doesn’t like him?” Conor guesses.

Flower outrights laughs in his face before shaking his head and crawling into his bedroll. He doesn’t even give Conor a proper answer.

 

-

 

It’s not what he expected, to say the least.

They're in yet another clearing in the Azerbaijan wilderness when Sidney signals for them to stop. "Home," Sidney calls out, a strange edge to his voice when he says it.

"Pittsburgh," a voice answers. A man steps out of the shadows, hands up, and smiles warmly. "Sid."

Sidney lowers his gun. "Hey, G," he returns when Geno stops in front of him, his voice quiet and soft. Conor almost feels like he shouldn't be watching any of this, like he's intruding on something.

Duper interrupts though. "Geno," Duper booms, walking up to him and clapping him on his back. "Been a while."

"Pascal," Geno says, grinning at him. He looks around at the others. "Flower. Tanger. Sunshine." His eyes fall on Conor, who suddenly feels anxious. "New guy?"

"Yeah, Conor Sheary, we call him Shearsy," Sidney answers. "Shearsy, this is Geno.”

They exchange greetings before Geno turns back to Sidney. "Sasha tell me you need evac? Nicky not coming until tomorrow. I have place we can wait until then."

Sidney nods. "Lead the way."

Definitely odd, Conor thinks as they follow Geno to his safehouse.

 

-

 

Conor assumes they’re all old friends. They’re all catching up, exchanging stories while they open up their MREs.

“Then I’m see giant - ah, how you say -,” Geno scratches his head and Duper laughs.

“Just say it in Russian, G, you know we can all speak it.”

Geno makes a face. “I have to practice. Besides,” he looks over at Sidney, “Sid’s accent is terrible.”

“That’s what happens when you don’t teach him Russian.”

Geno harrumphs. “I’m teach plenty. Only important words.”

Conor can only stare when Sidney flushes bright red.

Later, while the others make themselves comfortable for a night of sleeping not outside, Sidney and Geno stand over by a table, close, shoulders pressed together. Conor sits on his bedroll a little ways from them, just barely able to pick up on their conversation. It's mostly Geno just going over his last mission with Sidney, but then -

"Happy to see you," Geno says quietly. "I'm know you not want be there, but still happy."

Sidney looks at him, silent for a while before he looks back down. "I'm happy too," he answers, even quieter, though his face doesn't show it. "You know it’s not that I don’t want to be here.”

"Two days, I know," Geno replies, amused. "Just two days, Sid. And it's not like we have mission together."

Sidney wrinkles his nose.

"Gross, huh?"

Conor feels his blood run cold as he turns over to Beau, who's lying down on his bedroll. He thinks he's starting to catch on to what's going on between Sidney and Geno and if they've known the others as long as he thinks they have, then he would think that they're okay with it but -

"They're so into each other," Beau continues with a grimace. "I've only seen them together when Geno's visiting on leave. You wouldn't think they shoot people and steal national secrets for a living. They just spend all their time getting lost in each other's eyes and being disgustingly cute."

"And having a lot of sex," Flower adds in with a whisper, causing Beau to groan and roll over to his other side. He grins at Conor before leaning it. "Sidney's supposed to have his leave in two days. He thinks it's bad luck if they ever meet on a mission. That’s why they only ever get to see each other when they’re on leave.”

Conor flops down on his bedroll, flooded with relief before he feels a small curl of unease at the pit of his stomach.

 

-

 

Their evac gets interrupted when Ovechkin sends them intel that there are anti-aircraft guns they’ll need to take out before they can be extracted.

It's simple enough. Until they're met with what's essentially a small army.

"Bad luck," Conor hears Sidney mutter over Geno’s map while Flower and Tanger are cobbling together a plan with the blocks of C-4 they have left between them.

Geno rolls his eyes fondly beside him. "Sid -"

"I told you it's bad luck -"

"We're together," he says firmly, holding Sidney's gaze. "How can it be bad luck?"

 

-

 

They were only prepared for a simple recon mission. They've taken out the guns, but they're being hunted, outgunned and outnumbered.

"I stay behind," Geno says while they're counting their bullets. "Distract, slow them down. You head to LZ."

"No," Sidney says immediately. "We're not leaving you behind to die."

"Who says I die?" Geno says with a grin. Sidney doesn't return it. "Just buy a few more minutes for you. I meet you there."

"Like hell you will," Sidney snaps. "You'll probably get yourself killed with a stupid plan like that."

Conor knows what Geno's thinking. A Russian body left behind can be explained as another casualty of the civil war. A body with a uniform affiliated with a country that shouldn't be anywhere near here can't.

"Maybe," Geno allows. "Better than all of us dying here."

A volley of gunfire ends any further discussion.

 

-

 

Sidney is silent all the way back to the states. Everyone watches him carefully, but no one dares to say a word.

Almost all of them had made it. They were right there, the Pave Low barely twenty meters away, but then Duper was shot in the leg and reinforcements kept pouring in and they were doing their best to put out enough covering fire to get Duper onto the Pave Low, but they could see RPGs being loaded in; on their comms Backstrom was shouting that they had to go _right now_ -

"Sid," Geno had said, pulling Sidney behind cover and taking the last of his magazines and grenades off his vest. "Sid, you trust me?" 

Conor could tell that Sidney was exhausted. They all were, running on hours of adrenaline, even fewer hours of sleep. Sidney breathed hard, pained. "Of course," he croaked, barely audible over the gunfire.

Geno looked at Conor, his eyes quietly pleading, and Conor understood. Turning back to Sidney, Geno smiled shakily before reaching up to yank off a gold chain around his neck, tucking it into Sidney's pocket. "I come back for this, later," he said, pressing a quick kiss on Sidney's forehead. "Keep safe for me, okay?"

Sidney shook his head, his hands scrabbling to hold onto him. "No, Geno -"

Geno shoved Sidney over to Conor, who immediately started pulling him to the Pave Low. "Go!" he yelled, giving them covering fire. "Go now!"

"Geno!" Sidney shouted, already fighting to pull himself from Conor’s grip. Conor ignored his orders to let him go, managed to make it close enough to get Flower to help him drag Sidney up onto the Pave Low, and jumped on just as it started to lift. "Geno!"

Sidney hung over the edge of that Pave Low for the longest time. Conor doesn't want to know what he might've seen.

He hopes he didn't see a thing.

 

-

 

Evgeni Malkin was just another foot soldier of the Loyalists. A good soldier, but a rebel, nonetheless. He doesn't get a commendation, any recognition aside from the toast the Loyalists gave him when they determined him to be MIA.

If Sidney holds what Conor did against him, he doesn’t make it known. Conor thinks he knows that it’s what Geno wanted him to do. Conor is sure that Sidney's talked about what happened with Flower and them, but he doesn't mention it to the rest of them. He may not have known Sidney before that mission, but even he can tell that mission changed him.

He always heard stories about Sidney being superstitious, always doing certain things, avoiding certain things because he thinks it’s bad luck if he doesn’t. He had seen it firsthand when he saw Sidney clean his gun every night on the way to Azerbaijan, clearing the parts in the same order, the same way every time.

Sidney doesn't do it anymore.

 

-

 

"Extraction?"

Sidney nods. "We've got a high value target holed up in one of the Russian gulags."

"He has intel?" Flower asks.

“Potentially. And apparently it'll really piss the Russians off if we break him out."

Flower grins. "Well. That's all the reason I need."

 

-

 

It’s been a year since the mission and the Loyalists have managed to gain some ground in Russia, able to provide enough air support and squads to allow them to slip into the gulag.

In the chaos, there are prisoners escaping left and right, but they ignore them; intel tells them that their target is in their own high security cellblock, separate from the prison grid. They move quickly; the prison shakes with every bombing run, seemingly ready to collapse at any moment.

When they blow out the wall into the cell, the target ends up barrelling through the smoke and dust and right into Sidney, tackling him to the ground, yanking his gun out of his holster and pointing it at him. The rest of them immediately train their sights on the target, ready to shout for him to stand down, but when the dust settles -

“...Sid?”

Sidney blinks up at their target, his eyes widening when he realizes who it is. “Geno,” he breathes.

Geno, grimy and even thinner than before from what must have been a horrible year in the gulag, looks back at him, like he can’t believe what he’s seeing. Finally, he tosses the gun aside and climbs off of Sidney to help him up, his hands coming up to touch Sidney’s face. “Sid,” he repeats roughly.

Sidney’s hands immediately move to pull out something out from under his fatigues, the necklace that Geno gave him, hanging from from his neck this whole time. “I kept it for you,” Sidney says, his voice cracking.

Geno smiles. “Tell you I come back for it. We’re not bad luck.”

Conor politely spins right around when Sidney pulls Geno in for a kiss. “It would be so embarrassing if we all died because this place caved in on us while all of this happened,” Tanger mutters as he does the same, exchanging a knowing look with Flower.

Flower shrugs, smiling. “There are worse ways to go.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
